Monday, March 22, 2010

It's not 1810 and we're not miserable objects, most of us, but I wonder whether there's anyone out there who doesn't recognize this doctor-patient scenario.

I have been carried to one of the hospitals of this great town, supported by voluntary contributions. I shall relate what I saw. The physician, seated at a table in a large hall on the ground-floor, with a register before him, ordered the door to be opened; a crowd of miserable objects, women, pushed in, and ranged themselves along the wall; he looked in his book, and called them to him successively. Such a one! The poor wretch, leaving her wall, crawled to the table. " How is your catarrh ?" " Please your honour, no offence I hope, it is the asthma. I have no rest night nor day, and "—" Ah, so it is an asthma! It is somebody else who has the catarrh. Well, you have been ordered to take, &c." —" Yes, Sir, but I grow worse and worse, and—" —" That is nothing, you must go on with it,"—" But, Sir, indeed I cannot."—" Enough, enough, good woman, I cannot listen to you any more ; many patients to get through this morning,—never do to hear them talk,—go, and take your draught, &c."—The catarrh woman made way for a long train of victims of consumption, cases of fever, dropsy, scrofula, and some disorders peculiar to women, detailed, without any ceremony, before young students…

… There is, however, more indifference than ignorance here; for in no part of the world is the art of medicine carried farther than in London ; and, without being at all qualified to judge, the mere circumstance of this art and those who practice it being so much more respected here than in France, is sufficient to convince me of their superiority. In France, surgery is honoured, while medicine is slighted. Moliere has much to answer for this; and if Shakespeare had taken it into his head to laugh at physicians, there is no knowing how they would fare in England at this day.

Illustration above left is an 1820 view of Guy's Hospital. Below right is Middlesex Hospital from Ackermann's Microcosm of London (1808). You can see a larger, sharper image at Motco. More about the Microcosm here.

I feel for the poor woman with asthma! A "draught" could hardly compete with the soot and dirt she had to inhale every day.

The really scary part is that those poor folks were the lucky ones. I believe that in most cases, patients could only see a doctor at hospital if he/she had a recommendation from one of the governors on the hospital board.

Interesting that as a Frenchman he has so little regard for French medicine. I wonder if his opinion was universal in France as well at the time, or a more personal view after he'd the opportunity for a comparison with the English system?

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A Polite Explanation

There’s a big difference in how we use history. But we’re equally nuts about it. To us, the everyday details of life in the past are things to talk about, ponder, make fun of -- much in the way normal people talk about their favorite reality show.

We talk about who’s wearing what and who’s sleeping with whom. We try to sort out rumor or myth from fact. We thought there must be at least three other people out there who think history’s fascinating and fun, too. This blog is for them.